All That Glitters Ch. 11

Everyone was enjoying a casual breakfast the day after the christening of the four ships. Liea and Annette were scheduled to leave later that morning, so all were chatting amicably.

Henadi was looking through information for the Marlton Interplanetary University on Terra, which was frequently used by members of the navy to achieve various degrees. She was seeking information on attaining her PhD PA and looking at the requirements.

"You should get your doctorates!" she suddenly blurted out to Fiona.

The sudden silence startled her, and she looked up and around the table. She hadn't meant to be so loud as to interrupt things.

"Explain," Fiona said, noting Henadi blushing.

"Well, you are a Director of Operations for a mining platform, and a Commodore in the TUSN. From both achievements, you will receive up to twenty-one complimentary credits toward completing your doctorate. You would only have to complete six credits and the thesis to complete the degree," Henadi told her showing her the respective information.

"She's correct," Raymond spoke up. "With the way you go through course material, you could complete the courses within a few months leaving only your thesis. The only difficult thing would be to find time to do the material, but you managed to do that for your Senior Command Course which is actually more complicated than your doctorates would be.

"If you applied through Marlton as Director of Operations Liramor-23, they would want to know why you weren't going through a university on Liramor Prime, but if you applied as Commodore Marsh, and include the fact that you are director of a public institution, they wouldn't bat an eye. Your MBA would be transferable as that degree is generally standardized throughout the Union," he finished.

"It would be an asset for you when you come to Liramor Holdings," Annette added with a smile.

Fiona noted that Henadi was still blushing.

"Henadi?" she asked of her aide.

"I need to do it too, but I will not get the credits you will because I have not been promoted captain. I would only receive twelve credits for the course. If I was captain, I would gain an additional four credits," she told her. "We could do the courses you need to complete together, which would be a big help to me in achieving my doctorates as well," she finished.

"I thought your degree was in engineering?" Fiona asked, remembering something from Noor's history.

"Initially, yes," she confirmed. "But I got bored working with engines and transferred to the command structure. I got my MEng while working in engineering and then my MBA after changing to command," she finished.

Fiona thought about it for a moment. Three of her five captains had doctorates, Raymond and Watt in Engineering, while Dostier's was a PhD PA, which meant she could help. Dent and Dauphine had masters, but she couldn't recall immediately in what. If they were MBAs, maybe they could school together.

"We'd need someone to counsel us for our thesis," she said to Dostier. She got a smile and a nod back.

"Just to let you know, I am a stickler for detail and true task master," she said with a nasty grin.

"If any of you have subordinates who are looking for their PA as well, let me know. Our unique situation here gives us more time on platform than say anti-pirate patrol, and I am not averse to paying for an accredited instructor that would help all of us," Fiona finalized, smiling at her aide.

They finished breakfast and stood for images as all of them were in full navy regalia. Once Annette had the images she wanted, they headed down to bay eleven.

Fiona watched the departure of The Princess and Delilah, somehow saddened as they moved out of the bay. The sadness surprised her. She hadn't realized she'd become so much a friend of Annette and Liea.

Pallanders Orbital Shipyard, Liramor Prime, Liramor System, Thirty Light Years from Terra

Master Chief David Sprawl looked out at the ship he would have to have to outfit. He had been a Master Chief for ten years and had outfitted no less than eleven new ships in that time. This would be his twelfth and last, and one of the most unique.

FAdm Thenton had called him into his office and made him the offer.

"Master Chief, I have an unusual assignment for you. I know that you have reached the end of your service, so this will be my last request of you," he said gravely as they sat casually taking coffee.

"Something special, you say, sir?" he said with a smile.

"It's classified and you will not be able to tell a soul of what you are about to learn should you decided to accept," Thenton had intoned.

Now that got the Chief's ear. He'd heard the words before, but never from a Fleet Admiral. He knew Thenton and knew these words would ring true.

"What's the job, sir," he asked nodding to Thenton.

"I need you to outfit a special ship. It's something right out there in left field. You're going to love it," Thenton told him with a nasty smile.

David smiled at the memory. Yep, he was loving it alright. A navy ship, posing as a pleasure craft, or was that the other way around?

This ship would contain a lot of specialized equipment. She would have to respond to situations on the fly and not be able to head to base to retrieve items that were required. Fortunately, she was big enough to hold a lot of material.

Normally, a ship this size would have a compliment of almost 500 crew, add to that a battalion of 600-800 Marines, and you get a lot of necessary storage space.

Now, she would be crewed by 100, with a company of 160 Marines versus a Battalion, not including the VIP staff, which might add another fifty. Two hundred and ten souls on a ship designed to support up to 1,500, there would be room to spare.

David began to go over the necessary items that all ships needed in his mind. Those could be procured from the Liramor Navy Base, but the specialty items, such as Combat Drop Shuttles, mines, missiles, and torpedoes, would have to go to the ship's home base. A freaking mining platform!

Damn, the admiral could think up the good ones!

Malihan Regional Hospital, Green's World, Harn System, Twenty Light Years from Terra

Dr. Heyya snuck in to say good morning to her favorite patient and friend, Sean Murphy. She had finished her duties on the surgical ward and was now doing family medicine with another senior doctor acting as her supervisor, but she always took the time to check on Sean.

"Good morning, Sean," she said in the sing-song voice she had acquired of necessity for family medicine.

He gave her a laugh and wiggled his hands at her. After a month and a half, he had at last been freed from his restraints, the insufferable itching finally relenting.

He had just finished his breakfast so Heyya quickly pulled aside the sheet that covered him and then gave him a cute pout.

"What?" he asked. "Ayesha is not the only nurse that comes in here, and they all want to look at my legs, so I have to cover my nudity," he told her with a wink.

Heyya giggled. The man had been so stuffy when she first met him, but he had grown more gregarious and amiable in the time she had known him.

Sean's legs had grown considerably since the regen process had begun. The lower legs were growing well just below the new knee joints and it would soon be time to activate the growth of his ankles and feet. The timing there was a little tricky, as they could not let the size of the bones of his legs get too big before the ankles and feet were activated. If they missed the timing, they would have to wait for the legs to completely form before starting a new regen process for his feet.

However, there was an app for that. Literally, the hospital had an app that allowed doctors to do all kinds of calculations and Heyya, as an intern, now had full access to it.

She had to purchase a better comp, but it had proved its worth almost immediately. Good thing she had funds set aside because she was not being paid as an intern! She wondered what it would cost to buy the app when she left the hospital.

Heyya took in the discoloured skin of his regenerating limbs and noted that the colour was well within the standards. She was pleased and told Sean so.

Ayesha Seito sashayed into the room and reached up to give Heyya a tender kiss. The two roommates were doing much better now that Heyya was back, but Ayesha knew it was only temporary. Soon, Heyya would return to Liramor Prime, and she would again lose her friend and lover.

Sean saw the look of sadness that came over Ayesha's face and figured he knew the cause for it. He took both into a hug that lasted a little longer than normal. Heyya smiled at her friends and then quickly left the room. She had to get to work and didn't want to do so with tears in her eyes.

Pallanders Orbital Shipyard, Liramor Prime

Master Chief Sprawl sat at the controls of a small shuttle. He was parked just outside of the exterior construction bay that was being used for the refit of The Wanderer.

Damn, that ship was big! Thenton had told him that the ex Korman was in a class of her own, and Sprawl believed him. The ship was in the same size league as a Battle Cruiser!

Many access panels and hatches were opened around the ship, giving access to the EVA suited workers for the necessary work. Sprawl hated seeing the openings. A ship in space should always be tightened down.

As he watched, pale green Marilon generators were being removed from the engine section. It made sense to replace them now, even if they were not that old.

They were large three-meter by three-meter by four-meter generators. He had already counted six of them being removed from this section. Most large ships carried nineteen generators, usually mounted in groups of three with one individual generator dedicated to local electrical power, so two power sections had been removed from this side. He wondered what had happened on the other side.

As he was speculating, he saw a large four-meter, pale blue cube being moved into the engine room. Wait? Pale blue? All Marilon generators were green. He watched as additional cubes followed the first into the side of the ship. Five more followed the first, so two power sections.

Something else caught his eye and he noted that an oversized Quebec-Type sub-light engine was being removed from the rear of the ship. She had eight of these engines, necessary to push her to her max speed, somewhere in the low eighty percent light range.

He watched as a new engine was installed on the vessel, but this one didn't look the same. It fit properly, so it had to have the same mating connections as the older model, but it didn't seem as bulky as what was removed.

Sprawl had seen enough. He manoeuvred his small shuttle down and into the open shuttle bay door and landed within the large bay. Snapping his helmet down, he activated his boot magnets and moved out of the shuttle. He was surprised when he discovered that the grav plates were still active.

Moving to the airlock, he cycled through and went to find the duty foreman. He was a little further forward set up in a cargo bay and was surrounded by a group of men looking at plans on a worktable.

The foreman finished his instructions and people began to disperse. Sprawl sidled up to him.

"Master Chief Sprawl," he spoke in standard, opening his visor.

"Clive Spenser. I'm the duty foreman, not the executive foreman," he told the chief while shaking his hand.

"That's OK. I just need some information. I noticed what I thought to be Marilon generators being placed in various places in the hull, but they were blue in colour. Can you explain that?" the chief asked.

"Ah, the new M/A generators," he said nodding. "They are a new class of generator. First major improvement in over 100 years. Better control over their power output, and much faster recharge time," he finished.

"How much faster?" the chief asked, curious.

"They can recharge in an hour," he told the chief.

"You're shitting me?" the chief said surprised.

Clive laughed and explained about the new capabilities of the Marilon/Aruna generators.

"That's not the only thing. Dr. Aruna got bored once she set up the automation of the new generator factory and started to look at how the power was used at the end product, the FTL engines and the sub-light engines, the pulse generators for the cannon. In fact, she has been looking at remaking just about any system that ties directly into the generators to improve them.

"You might have noticed the new Q-Type engines?" he asked the chief. "Well they are at least forty percent more efficient. They consume far less power than the older models and can easily push this ship to what we hope will be around ninety-five percent light. Even if they only just exceed ninety percent light, that will be a major improvement on what she was capable of before," Clive finished with an obvious note of pride.

"And you say the FTL engines are improved as well?" the chief asked.

Clive held up a finger and cued his mike. "Marion, peuvez vous venir au bureau, s'il vous plaît."

A moment later a young woman sauntered into the foreman's office and smiled at the chief.

"Marion, this is Master Chief Sprawl," he told the woman in standard. "Please take him around where he wants to go and explain things to him. He is not aware of many of the new features on the ship," Clive finished.

"Please follow me, sir," she said to the chief with a smile and walked away.

"That won't be hard to do," Sprawl quipped to the foreman as he watched Marion walk.

The foreman smiled. That's why they hired Marion. She was a good engineer's assistant, but she was much better at being a spokesperson to the occasional VIP that trundled through the working area. She was familiar enough about the systems to keep even the chief informed and pretty enough to keep most VIPs out of the workers hair.

Smiling, Clive went back to work. One less problem for the day.

Conference Room One, Liramor-23, Piscium System

Fiona had received the data from the FTL comms probe from Liramor Prime. She received a dispatch directly from Annette explaining what they had discovered with the IPPF agent. She brought the information directly to Adm. Heist and sealed the room.

"Well, that is interesting," Heist stated after being briefed. "She will have to come here eventually; in case the good senator has another operative on the platform. In the meantime, we have to figure out how we are going to use her to get to him," Heist finished.

"Another operative?" Fiona asked.

"Unlikely, but not improbable. It is difficult enough to place one agent somewhere, it is distinctly more dangerous and riskier to place two," he told her.

"But he already has an agent in place here, sir," Fiona told him. "We just have to let him know, somehow," she said with a smile.

"Didn't I read somewhere that the senator has a compound near a vacation resort, and that he has a temple to Andanii that he allows people from the resort to make use of?" Fiona asked.

"We'd have to teach him how to work this case," Heist told her, catching on.

"Shouldn't that be the job of the IPPF, sir, now that they are onto our senator?" Fiona asked.

"By the Gods Fiona, I should have found you before Charles did!" Heist said with a smile.

"Sorry, sir. It's no contest. You would have left me in the background, while Charles left me in command of my own platform. He wins hands down," she told Heist with a smile.

Heist burst into laughter. "Damn, I will be sorry to see the end of my time here," he told her.

IPPF HQ, Liramor Prime, Liramor System

Carolyn Justine was sparring with Analisa Talbot, or rather, attempting to spar. The woman kept putting her down with an ease that almost angered the Spec Ops Officer. Finally, they took a break and got some water.

"Damn, Analisa! Is there anyone who is your equal?" Justine asked.

"Only one person I know of on this planet is better than me, Kim Oshiiru, Liea Samson's bodyguard," Analisa told her.

"Wait, I though you were Samson's bodyguard?" Justine asked confused.

"PSec, in charge of her detail. I was her bodyguard at first but had to step back when we added more people to her detail. Now Kim is her personal bodyguard," she told Justine.

"Why are you here at IPPF HQ then?" Justine asked.

"VSC is contracted to do training for IPPF here on Liramor Prime. There are only three of us who do that, Kim is one of the other two," Analisa told her.

"I'd like to meet this Kim," she said with a smile.

"No, you wouldn't," Analisa returned, shaking her head. "In the same way that I am above you in ability, Kim is above me. You can't touch me if I don't want you to, and I can't touch Kim. You would have absolutely no chance with Kim," Analisa assured her.

"In fact, there is only one person I know of that is even Kim's equal, and he is not on this planet."

"And who might that interesting person be?" Justine asked.

"That would be Capt. Raymond Clark, late of the Black Lightning Engineer Brigade and hero of Emporium. One of the eight that made it back alive," Analisa responded.

"He fought her to a standstill then gave her the match in order that she wouldn't lose face in front of her subordinates. I think Kim is in love with him," Analisa said with a smile.

She called up a holo image of Clark in full regalia on her comp. Justine whistle softly on looking at him.

"Yep, that's what all the women say when they see him," Analisa quipped with a smile. "I thought seeing him naked was something, but when he showed up in full regalia, wow!"

"What? Wait! You saw him naked? You have to tell me this story!" But Analisa just smiled at her and pointed back to the mat.

Just then, Chief Superintendent Maria Sanger, Dir. IPPF Operations on Liramor Prime, looked in through the door and pointed to the pair motioning them to follow. They took seats in the Director's office.

"Your assessment?" Sanger asked of Analisa.

"She's better than most here, but not up to higher VSC standards. She learns quick and will likely be a good asset for you. It wouldn't be long before she would be your best officer if you kept her, but she needs to improve her French," she said.

"Thank-you for your candor," Sanger said rising and shaking Analisa's hand.

Understanding that she was being dismissed, Analisa waved to Justine and quietly left.

"I like her," Sanger stated, "no fuss, no muss.

"New orders, or rather, more of the same with a twist. You will be 'hired' by LMC and sent to Liramor-23, but you will not be a miner while you are there. Adm. Rallond Heist, head of Navy Intelligence, is currently at Liramor-23. He has a task for you and instructions vis-à-vis our wayward senator.

"Do well on this task and you will save your career, and your ass," she informed Justine. "See the sergeant outside my door." Justine stood and gave the Division head a salute.

The sergeant was waiting outside the door. She took Justine to a back room where Meteryea was waiting.

"Good morning, Ms. Corden. How have you been?" he asked politely, an amused grin on his face.

The sergeant handed Meteryea a form which he read and then signed.

"Your ass is now mine!" he growled menacingly, then broke into an infectious smile. He waved her to join him and headed for the door.

"Wait, my kit?" Justine asked.

"It's already in the transport," Meteryea said. "It's OK, I'll let you chose your own seat this time," he quipped, laughing. Justine couldn't help shaking her head and grinning as she followed him.

Pallanders Orbital Shipyard, Liramor Prime, Liramor System

Sprawl followed Martin Pallanders into a construction bay where two small identical ships were currently berthed. There was a lot of activity around both vessels.